Is the Food Network Overcooked?

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Over at Vulture, Jesse David Fox weighs in on Food Network’s Batali-heavy past, its grease-bomb-saturated Guy Fieri–fied present, and what appears to be its future overwrought with marathon-ready cooking competition shows. These days, the network seems like it has “no backup plan,” and meanwhile, its current lineup functions best as a “zone-out destination,” rather than proffering entertainment and education. The twenty-year-old channel, which had a precipitous decline in viewers earlier this year, doesn’t necessarily have go back to teaching viewers how to use measuring cups in order to move forward, Fox writes, but in the absence of any real breakout stars, the network needs “some new, remotely well-produced series to strengthen its spell.” [Vulture, Related]